I imagine NPOwer set your account up on estimated meter readings that were lower than the real readings were. Thus you have been billed a massive amount for nine months, ie: it is not accurate. Did you or anyone else take the meter readings when you changed supplier? If so, have you checked your first NPower bill to see if the start readings on the bill match up with the readings you took? Alternatively, NPOwer may have billed you based on estimated readings after a correct start reading. Check your meters to see if the readings match up with what's on the bill.

I'm sorry - slap on the wrist for me!

PS: I didn;t think SWALEC existed anymore or have one of the suppliets changed their name yet again? As afr as I was aware, the main suppliers are EON, NPower, BGas, EDF, Scottish & Southern and Scottish Power

They will do it if they have to though. I know people do get them removed sometimes. I would have thought if you tell SWALEC, you will change supplier if they don't remove it, then they will want to change it rather than lose you as a customer. Maybe this won't work - it does cost the supplier quite a bit of money to arrange an appointment and change a meter. As I say, if that is the case, maybe its time to change supplier since they are not offering very good customer service.

But whether you are or were in credit is meaningless unless the bills are based on at least some meter readings.

Have to say SWALEC's response is idiotic. Being debt free is meaningless when there is a prepayment meter. If you don't pay anything towards the electric, you don't receive any electric with a prepayment meter! How can the OP prove she is a decent credit-risk now? The only way is by doing the credit-check now and having a credit meter fitted now if the OP passes the credit check, not in 6 months time. I would say SWALEC are just playing for time, hoping the OP will have forgotten about wanbting a credit meter in six months time. What difference will there be in six months time, the OP will still have the prepayment meter and not able to prove they are a good credit-risk! I would suggest if the OP definitetuy wants a credit meter (and personally, in their situation, I would want one rather than continuing with the prepayment meter) that they demand a credit meter be fitted now or they will go to a different supplier. I would hyave thought some suppliers would be prepared to change the meter to a quarterly one upon becoming their customer at no cost to the OP.

DipsyDoo, how much is being paid on the prepayment meter each week towards the original debt of around £200? How long ago was the prepayment meter fitted? Possibly the power went because of the money being paid off through the meter towards the debt (especially if it has been set at something like £10.00 per week). This still gets paid even if virtually no electric is being used. Just a possibility. If it has been set at a high amount, you could contact your supplier and ask for it to be reduced (I believe to as little as £2.50 or £3.00 per week) as you are on benefits. Your supplier should agree to this.

Meursalt, I am quite aware that sometimes utility companies treat customers badly. However, it should not be assumed that a problem is always caused by the company treating the customer badly.

I would say the name issue is certainly not irrelevant. If I got a letter addressed to the occupier, I would open that letter to see what it is about. Often, a marketing letter of course, but nevertheless I would open it. The OP clearly did not open these letters. And the utility company sent a letter addressed to the occupier, instead of the customer by name, because of the possibility of the customer having moved out (as already stated on this thread). So the Op had received letters about the situation, it was her choice not to open letters addressed to the occupier. NPower should have returned the ansafone messages left by the OP. That would be good customer service. NPower do not seem to offer the best customer service out there compared to other utility providers it would appear, and this does not help their cause. My original points remain. If the OP was at all helpful initially, this would never have happened. Maybe NPower should have handled things better and been in more contact with the OP. however, who's to say that the OP would not have slammed the door (figuratively speaking) in the utility company (or their representative's) face again. Meaursalt, you are talking rubbish again. A meter-reader will normally spot a meter if it outside on the front wall (as you state it is). Besides, they know the information on the hand-held machines is frequently out of date (frequently dates back to 1993 or 1994!) or just purely incorrect. It is in their interest to obtain a meter reading if possible, certainly in my area of the country. We get paid on the basis of number of meters read and percentage read. Therefore, it would not be in our interest to input this as a non-reading. Your reaction to my (and Zazen's) post suggests you don't like it up em, as it were. You are quite happy to give out stick to utility companies but don't like it when someone says you could be at least partly to blame for the situation. You sulk and state you won't get involved again on the forum - that shows you have lost the argument. I personally work as a meter reader at the moment. I do not work for a utility company, I read meters on behalf of several utility companies (namely, EON, BGas, Southern, and occasionally EDF and NPower). I know that utility companies are not infallible, but I know also that certain individuals do not help themselves. I say it as I see it, I do not apologise for that. And this is not just for the reason of being contrary. As Clare has stated, how can the OP know if the amount billed is accurate, if no meter-reading has been provided? Doubtless, she would kick up a right fuss if it turns out it had been grossly underestimated.

Its funny how these bad things always happen to you, meursalt. Like the OP, if yuo were at all helpful to companies in the first place instead of treating everything as a them and us battle, maybe you would not have had so much grief. Besides, I find your tale impossible to believe. Maybe once a meter-reader may have missed the meters, but consistently??!! Pull the other one. Maybe if your meters are buried underneath out of control shrubbery, but otherwise - not on your nellie!

Al the OP needed to do was let the reader have access to read a meter in the first place. All this nonsense about being a single lone female. The reader would have an ID card you know. If the OP had just been a little bit helpful, actually courteous is the word, in the first place, she wouldn't have had all these problems. No-one to blame but herself. If you behave obstructively, then it is not surprising if it comes back at a later time and bites you. Put yourself in a meter-reader's shoes. He/she might visit 100 households in half a day for example, 99 of them will be either really pleasant or perfectly polite. 1 out of those households may have a bad attitude. They may get uppity with the reader for no good reason ( being woken up at 10.00am on a weekday for example), they may be deliberately awkward (refusing access saying they require an appointment for example) or condescending for no good reason (these people are just prats, in my eyes). And it really is such a tiny proportion of people that give problems, actually its probably far less than 1 in every 100 households that give any problem. In fact, a small number of people will offer a drink on a baking hot summers day. And yes OP, some of these last named people are women living on their own and some are elderly at that (shock, horror!) Not saying that everyone should do this of course, but I at least they don't have plod knocking down their front door with a warrant. I'm sorry but the OP is spouting forth nonsense, had she not seen the meter-reader working in her locality, coming in and out of houses at very frequent intervals? And meursalt22, I think you will find that this kind of thing would have happened more in the past, when the utilies had not been privatised. There was much more emphasis then on visiting properties and making sure meters were read (eg: even when someone moved out of a house, they would come to the house, take a reading and disconnect the supply).

Bit strange why BG are billing the OP's sister in the name of the occupier when the OP is suggesting that there has been contact between her sister and BG previously. Either BGas have well and truly messed up (and therefore the outstanding arrears is likely to be inaccurate) or the OP is being economical with the truth. I would suggest that £600.00 is a large amount to be behind in on a utility bill - seeing as most people don;t get billed more than £200 per quarter.

LauraJane. I would suggest something is wrong with how NPower are billing you. Did NPOwer start your account off on the same gas and electric readings that your previous supplier ended your account with them on. Were these estimates or actual readings? And have NPower calculated your usage based upon estimates or proper readings? How much of the £87.00 per month usage is for gas and how much for electric? Does your electric meter have one or two (or even three) readings? If there is more than one reading, it is possible that NPOwer have got the meter readings back to front. This could well cause hugely inaccurate bills. If all of the above has been done correctly, then you are well within your rights to ask for a check meter to be fitted temporarily so that it can be established whether your meter is working correctly or not. If you insist, then NPOwer muct do it. They cannot refuse. However, you have to pay an initial charge to NPower. If it is found that your meter is faulty, NPower will refund you this fee. If your meter is in fact working correctly, I believe they won't refund it. Therefore, you need to check all other avenues first. And have NPower not considered the fact that yours could be one of the minority of meters that aren't working correctly. Anyway, other posts I have seen on this forum would suggest that it is fairly common for meters to be inaccurate, to a greater or lesser extent. I believe there are ways of testing whether the meter is correct yourself, or from an independent electrician, etc. Unfortunately, I am not sure what these are. Perhaps someone else on this forum can help more with this. Do not let NPower walk all over you. NPower have got a pretty appalling reputation for their customer service (or lack of it) and they should not be allowed to shrug their shoulders and insist nothing is wrong without investigating things further, if need be.

What a mature post, PGH7447....

Mummam, are you still on E7 tariff. If you are, I think you should ask to go on the supplier's single rate tarifff as it does not appear you are using enough electric in the night time to make the E7 tariff pay. I think from your earlier posts, you may have already arranged thius but I'm not quite sure.

According to the original post, the error was in the poster's favour. The OP does not have electric heating, yet the supplier was billing most of the units used on the night rate, ie: the cheap price. On reflection, the OP may have a point as the suopplier are trying to bill some of the units used now once they have realised the mistake after they have already billing the OP (albeit the wrong way round). If it was the supplier's (or their agents) fault (which it undoubtably was) then they should be cutting their losses, shouldn;t they? I'm sorry mummam for jumping the gun in the previous post. You told the supplier that the bills were wrong even when the m,istake was in your favour. You shouldn't be penalised for your honesty.

I would add that meter readers are not told the previous readings either on their machine and often the Day and Nights are not marked on the machine so it can be impossible to know which way round to put the readings on the machine. Even if the meter-reader has input the readings correctly, this does not guarantee the supplier actually using the readings unfortunately. I have often had people compaining that I or a colleague come to read the meter and then the supplier doesn't use the readings (estimating them instead). This seems to happen to the same customers time after time, most people are not affected by it. However, it soulnd to me like the supplier have done all they can to sort out the problem once they realised the problem existed. You do have to pay something you know Mummam, if you use the electric. Just because the supplier has made a mistake, you can't expect them to charge you absolutely nothing. That is what you are asking for as far as I can make out, although ithe post does not lay the situation out very clearly.

Oh ok, more power is used off this meter than I thought would be. Even so.

I doubt it has been reaed wrongly continuously. I would think it is far more likely that either the reading has been taken wrongly to generate the £27000 bill, or alternatively the wrong (far too low) start reading was used on the computer records when the meter was fitted. Alternatively they may have the wrong meter details. Does the reading on the bill match up with what is on the meter and does the serial number on the meter match up with that on the bill? There is no way £27 000 worth of electricity would be used in a common area, even other many years. I mean, what electric is being used - lighting and possibly an alarm?

Sounds like your supplier's computer records are up the shoot. They probably confused your address with somewhere else that did have a meter changed back in 2004. Daft, but not an unknown occurence unfortunately. Some people have had this happen to them when they have a cardmeter. Difficult to get to an outlet that still gives out tokens for cardmeters in some places round here as they only accept keys for recharging. Yet the supplier won't book a job to change the cardmeter for a keymeter becasue they don;t think the cardmeter is still there anyway. Madness!

DJ Bicker, as you gave them a meter reading when you moved out abnd as meters are not difficult to read (unless it was an old dial meter), then EON can't now bill you saying they didn;t get the final reading off you - after they had given you a £70.00 refund. The cheek of it!

Did you check the start reading on the first bill from NPower against the reading you took when you moved in (if you did take one). Do they match up? I would have thought that something is wrong if you have been paying £100 per month, yet are still £543.07 in debt! Especially as it has been summer for the last few months. Another payment option is to ask for a payment card where you pay an amount into the Post Office regularly. You can then choose what amount is paid and actually pay for what you use (as long as you know what the unit price of your gas and electric is - if not, it will be on the statements). With my supplier Ebico, I can pay what I like, when I like, on the card.

Erroneous post by me -sorry!

Don't want to sound flippant - but maybe you should turn detective and try and trace your ex flatmate. I assume when you state they have done a runner, that means you don't know where they are now? As has already been stated, the electric supplier legally can chase who they wish to for the debt. However, maybe you could ask them to try and chase the disappearing tenant for their share. They don't have to do this but you never know - and they can only say no!

Yeah, for what period did Southern bill you up to? And do the final reading for Southern and the start reading for EDF match up?